Network of pharmacies

For Health, we care with proximity.

Farmácias Portuguesas are always at people's side, at every stage of their lives, providing personalised healthcare, provided by highly qualified teams that the population trusts.

They function as a true health network at the service of people, collaborating with other organisations and other levels of healthcare and responding to the specific needs of each community.

Due to its accessibility, wide geographical distribution and extended opening hours, the pharmacy is often the first and, in many areas of the country, the only point of contact with the health system.

A network of more than 2,700 community pharmacies, distributed from the north to the south of the country, including the islands and the interior, which guarantees a constant, quality response to the more than half a million people who visit Portuguese pharmacies every day.

As well as guaranteeing the dispense and safe access to medicines and other health technologies, community pharmacies provide differentiated health services centred on disease prevention and health promotion.

Examples of this are the administration of vaccines, rapid screening tests for infection and programmes to support adherence to therapy, which highlight the increasingly important role of the pharmacy network in responding to the needs of communities, by continually expanding the range of essential health services on offer.

The daily work in pharmacies is carried out by qualified professionals, whose numbers have more than doubled in the last 20 years.

There are now an average of 4.1 pharmacists per pharmacy, in addition to technicians and pharmacy supporting technicians, which is indicative of the high and growing level of competence of the teams that make up the community pharmacy network.

This human and technical capital has proved essential, especially in times of crisis, such as during the pandemic, when pharmacies ensured continuity of care, carried out tests, administered vaccines and supported the population with reliable and accessible information.

In this way, the value installed in the network of community pharmacies is a strategic and structural asset, fundamental to the country's health response capacity in public health matters.